Technori showcases women founders at wearables event

When podcast host Scott Kitun took over CEO of Technori earlier this year, he made a pledge to feature women as half of the founders and speakers onstage. On Tuesday, he added a panel to the startup showcase to continue that push.

Kitun hosted the panel of three women in wearable technologies, asking them about the challenges they’d faced getting into the space. The answer: They haven’t let being a woman faze them.

“My experience so far hasn’t really taught me that you are a woman and there’s this obvious thing you can’t do,” said Carrie Shaw, founder of Embodied Labs, which creates virtual reality programs that capture patients’ experiences to train caregivers. “I never felt it was a limitation.”

Nikita Parikh, founder of Anansi, a company that makes software that integrates into a wearables and will call 911 if the user goes into flight-or-fight mode, said she wasn’t trying to get into wearables — she was just building a solution to a problem she faced.

Lauren Fellure, a partner at SnapMobile, said her company doesn’t hire women just to meet a quota — it hires the best person for the job, and that very often happens to be a woman.

“What I try to tell women in the tech space is not to be focused on it,” she said. “Be the absolute best that you can.”

Technori typically does not feature panels. The 6-year-old event usually features a keynote and five-minute pitches each from five startups.

One female-founded company scheduled to pitch Tuesday night canceled last minute, Kitun said. With that, women would not have represented 50 percent of people onstage without the panel. One female founder wasn't able to make last month's pitch event, dropping women representation below half.

“If she ever wants to start a company, I hope it’ll be a no-brainer for her,” she said. “Her friends will be venture capitalists, her friends will be software designers,...

This was Technori’s 59th event in Chicago. The company says the showcase has hosted about 300 companies on its stage, some of which have gone on to raise a total of $260 million in funding.

Tuesday’s event focused on wearable technology. Anansi and Embodied Labs pitched, as did Rithmio, which develops movement-recognition technologies for wearables, and JioBit, which is making a device that can help parents keep track of their kids.

Terry Howerton ⇒, founder and CEO of TechNexus, was the keynote speaker. TechNexus is launching the second year of its Emerge accelerator program for industrial wearable technology.

The program is done in partnership with the Department of Homeland Security and focuses on developing wearables that could help first responders, he said. Fifteen companies will be accepted into the program, and applications are open now.

The public safety industry is in desperate need of technology solutions, Howerton said.

Most entrepreneurs tend to solve the problems they see, which could be why there are so many dating apps, he said. The challenge lies in redirecting that gaze.

“The leading cause of death among firemen is heart attack … because they sit sedentary for so long, then they’re on their way,” he said. “Are there wearable solutions that can help us understand when someone is at risk for that?”

Kitun also announced Technori Studio, which plans to offer training on how to build brands and digital audiences and product content. It will be based at Rivet News Radio and is scheduled to launch in October.